Tom Geiger

Cool Progress Rich! And the above quote from one of your posts... is there winter static in effect? I recently had some CA on the end of a toothpick, aiming it for the spot on the inside of the roof where I wanted to affix an interior sun visor. As I worked the toothpick down towards it's goal, suddenly the CA leapt onto the already installed windshield! And in such a zig zag pattern that there was no way I did it! Some one else responded to a post I made about it with a similar situation. Charlie- Looking forward to seeing you at NNL East. Stay in our host hotel and we have a great Friday evening get together. Some folks say it's more fun than the show!

This thread is like a train wreck. You don't wanna look, but something makes you come back for another look

Well, here's the deal... there were a few niggly details other than the roof he also fixed. There was something with the curve at the rear spoiler / trunk lid edge and something else with the shape of the bottom of the rear bumper. Quite frankly I didn't see any of the issues until he pointed it out with Before and After photos. And I don't think it matters a whole lot that "THEY KNEW, THEY WERE TOLD!" about the roof height. That change is a major rework of the largest part of the tool (and many parts it touches, like the glass shot and maybe more). No doubt, by the time they knew, it was too late to completely rework it, and stay within their time frame and budget. Where the problem is, is that we who see this hobby as near religion are maybe 5% of Revell's business. 95% of the people who buy the kit think it's just fine, and that's who they are out to please. The majority. The very few, a small percent of our 5% who absolutely can't live without these minute details being fixed, well they need to buy the resin. Yea, perfection costs a bit more. But you've illustrated my point clearly. You were one of the vocal guys complaining about the kit, but you're not buying the corrected resin.

The ancient Greeks threw all the losers off a cliff to their death. I miss that part.

Harry, just like every project you do professionally, I believe each kit project starts with a budget and project timeline. The design team must decide how much detail they can afford, and how many rounds of tooling reviews etc are in the budget and timeline. So for instance the team may want to do separate door handles and wipers, but having those added to the piece count may not be in the budget. It's much cheaper to just have them engraved on the body. To have them designed as separate parts involves designing all sides of them (on the body you're just engraving the top side), figuring them into a tree configuration, designing the attachment points and ejector pins needed to get a perfect part. I'm sure each decision on the kit has a lively debate about time and budget. I'm sure with many kits on round 3 of tooling modifications, there may still be some little details needing fixing, but the team reluctantly approves the tool for production because they don't have the time or funding to go through another round. In my own professional corporate life, everyone on my design teams truly wanted to do the very best we could. We'd design the Cadillac of facility projects, then we'd submit it to the estimators to find out just how far out of budget the ideal was. Then we'd go into the 'value engineering' phase where we debated how to produce it cheaper and which elements we wanted to include just didn't make it in the budget. Someone else mentioned that the tooling designers needed to have a passion for the subject. Not so, they just need really good information from which to accomplish their task. These folks (the Chinese here) are very talented craftsmen and work on a variety of projects, not just model cars, maybe not even in the realm of toys. They are injection molding specialists and can translate anything to a workable mold. For instance a friend of mine was a designer for AT&T and worked on product design for phones, cases, equipment enclosures and anything else that got injection molded. When that ship sailed, he managed to get hired into medical devices. A totally different product, but his skills translated. What happens is there is a loss of material from those who have done the photographing and measuring, as it goes down the food chain to those actually putting this into CAD or cutting into metal. It's happened to me many times. No matter how well we thought we took all the critical dimensions in the field, sitting at the CAD terminal, we discover we neglected one critical measurement that has us in a corner. In my world most of the time it was as easy as going back to the area and looking at it again. When you're in China and the subject matter and the team who provided you with the data are in the USA, it's much more difficult. Sometimes they are forced to make decisions as best they can with the lack of data to make a deadline and move the project along. I'm sure someone who has actually worked on model car projects can provide a better explanation, I'm just relating the realities of business project management. And I respond much better to an explanation of HOW and WHY than a biased blanked statement that "All Revell kits are garbage." I believe it was Greg Wann who jumped into the Mustang kit fracas and explained with exact measurements and his fixed master in each of the areas of design deficiency. That was an unbiased review, that also provided remedy of the situation. I know he was producing the 'fixed' resin body, and I'd be curious to know how many of the loud mouth complainers from the board actually ponied up the money to buy one.

Skip. rule number one per Harry, not me. http://www.modelcarsmag.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=33252

Harry, that's why I posted earlier and said the "how" and "why" are all dependent on the era that the kit in question was tooled up. Things that you describe about this kit were very acceptable in the 1970s, just as a Ford Maverick was very acceptable as transportation in that same era. Back then us kids didn't even notice that the funny car kits had factory stock bodies in them. It was the state of the market at that time and place. I do agree with you on the problems with kits like this. I'll mention one, the Heller Citroen Hotel Bus.. the bus body has so many ejector pins and sink marks that it would simply be easier to use it as a pattern to scratch build your own from plastic stock. And it hails back from that same era. The hobby wasn't matured just yet. I like a nice model as much as anyone else. I do a lot of research on what I build and will correct major issues and add missing details as best I can. But a long time ago I realized that it's just a hobby and in the grand scheme of things, it's just not worth getting all upset. Now granted there are guys whose hobby is finding faults with new model releases. Some are real dry engineering types who just manage to suck all the fun out of the hobby. Some are guys who just love the smell of their own gas and post non stop to impress themselves. Some of these guys haven't built a model in years. And there are those who truly don't have anything more important in their lives.

Harry, you started this fire, without giving us any information on which kit. The answer lies in the circumstances that the kit was created. And without being able to tie it to an era, the intended audience and the manufacturer, we cannot give you an answer. Not that I think you actually wanted a specific answer. George, I posted the Premier Falcon tongue in cheek just to tone it down a bit. When I first got into model cars I made the mistake of listening to all the flack about how horrible all the new kits were. I was so concerned that every model I did had to be absolutely perfect and show quality. I lost a lot of years of fun building worrying about all this stuff, that really doesn't matter in the grand scheme. Now, if a model looks good to me, good enough. I'm not going out there to find problems with a kit. Revell Mustang? Good enuf for my shelf. Quite frankly I don't even see the many issues these guys dream up. And nobody is gonna notice that in my case of 50 finished models. I have a lot more fun these days. What the heck??? I would have ignored this post except for the major slam on Revell, who is doing a pretty good job of putting out new subjects that we all are glad to get. I look at whoever Mr Cato may be and wonder what his credentials are? Looking at his posting history, he's contributed no in progress builds, no photos that exhibit that his work is so good that it demands perfect models from Revell, and no photos of finished models at all. In short you haven't contributed anything positive or constructive, so I do take offense to your rant.

Guys, don't even begin to dispute the accident video of '59 Chevy. That wasn't some old rust bucket they pulled out of a field. That was a show condition car. There was a piece I read where the owner of that car was seriously upset when he saw the video. When he sold it, all he was told was that it was going to be in a 50th anniversary ad campaign. As said, modern cars fare much better in accidents than the oldies. That's another 50 years of automotive technology and design by modern computer models. It's called progress. Today the lowliest Hyundai performs better than any of these old tanks. Fact, because the government standards demand it! If indeed, as described above, this was a parking lot hit at a car show... this performance isn't acceptable at all. What hits home here was that my father bought a similar LeMans new in 1966, and I spent a lot of time riding in it. Now here's a modern vehicle in a similar situation. My daughter got t-boned at an intersection by a lady going at least 40 in a 25 zone and never braked. Celica was pushed sideways through the intersection and up the curb and onto the sidewalk across the street. Nobody hurt. Not a scratch. You can even see the steel beam outline in the door. Yup, a modern vehicle doing exactly what it was designed to do. Thank God!

Hmmm... maybe if I chopped a few inches outta the roof, widened the body a bit.... Me thinks maybe we take our toy cars a bit too seriously!

I hate salespeople who refuse to listen to the customer and keep pushing their agenda. This past year my older daughter wanted to buy a specific 2012 Ford Fusion with 18,000 miles a local Ford dealer advertised on-line. We call ahead, yes the car is available. We get there, they 'can't find the car' and try to sell us higher priced cars. We decide to leave-- suddenly they 'find' the car. The salesman tries the "How much a month can you afford?" We tell him we're paying cash. He continues to try to sell a payment. He goes and moves the 'found' car out front of the building (we're sitting inside). He disappears. He drives up in a brand new Fusion in the same white color. Then he invites us outside and tries to sell us the new one. "Honey wouldn't you feel safer in a new car for only $200 a month more?" (The new one is double the price of the 2 yr old car) Again we state our position that we are paying cash for the used one. I add that if a Fusion with 18,000 miles on it is unsafe or unreliable, we will be buying neither. We test drive and decide to buy the used one. It's a very nice, fully loaded car that was leased for 24 months, but was taken back in an early return / lease upgrade after 20 months with 18,000 miles on it. Verified by paperwork. Actually verified by the lady who had it when my daughter ran into her in a parking lot and she recognized the car. I negotiate the price we want. We go across the street (a branch of our bank was literally across the street from the dealer) and get the check. We get in with the F&E guy who I cut off quick about extras and junk. With the check on his desk he again tries to get us to finance the car! Do these guys ever quit?! All in all, a trying day. Totally sucked the fun out of what could've been a nice experience.

Very cool and nice. If the board had a "Model of the Day" this would be it! Most folks didn't see potential in the BH kit, but it's an excellent light commercial base. Ken Kitchen built a couple of varieties from it.

Samoas! They are also called Caramel deLights. Yea, I just looked it up. Apparently GS cookies are made by two different bakers and each call it a different thing. Or maybe people thought they were made from real Samoans? One of the ice cream companies sells Girl Scout Samoa Cookie ice cream. To die for! Samoas are also sold as Keebler "Coconut Dreams" at your local grocery store.

Very nice! One suggestion. For the front directional on the fender tops... You can easily color the lens yellow or orange with Sharpie pens. The chrome will take it easily and will give a very finished look.

An easy place to look for detail photos is eBay Motors. Just look for the cars you are interested in, and some dealers will have 25-50 pictures of every detail, often including chassis shots. Just save those off to your hard drive for current or future builds. Detail your models as far as you'd like. Some guys will detail chassis by adding brake likes and emergency brake cables. You can add fuel line from the tank to the front of chassis also. Under the hood, the obvious are engine wires, battery cables, radiator and heater hoses, brake lines from the master cylinder and fuel lines to the carb. Then there are the small hoses that run from brake booster to manifold, from air cleaner to breather on valve cover etc. You can steal the a/c system from the AMT '71 Duster kit and detail that out too if you'd like. And on modern cars the wires and hoses are endless! I like to add small things that add a lot. For instance I'll use standard black Detail Master engine wire in different ways. Take small lengths of it and drill a hole in a tire rim, now you have a valve stem. Same in a door panel and it can become an interior door lock. There's a lot you can do to bring a model to life!

My first house had a small detached garage. My '60 Buick touched the back wall and I had to pull the garage door outward slightly to get it over the front bumper point!

Since we're all whining about gas stations, my peeve is self service stations! Yea, I know I'm from NJ and there's only two states left that have full service as standard. Oh, New Jersey has the cheapest gas prices in the country. Having grown up in Jersey, I'd much rather have someone pump my gas! The reason you'll never see self service in New Jersey is that the NJ Independent service station association opposes it because it serves big oil. In every state that there was a change to self service, the campaign was financed by big oil, with promise that gas prices would go down. In each case, once the law was changed, large oil companies cancelled leases with independent owners, blew out the service bays, installed a convenience store and turned it into a company owned location. Oh, and the initial token reduction in gas prices went away once the change over was complete. So self service is pro big oil and anti small business! And the funny thing is that self serve is one of those Tom Sawyer painting the fence things. The campaign always was "Vote for your RIGHT to pump your own gas. As if there was some major civil rights issue. And people fell for it. And now I know people will respond that they like to pump their own gas... see Tom Sawyer convinced you that you want to paint the fence! In NJ full service isn't any slower than if you pumped it yourself. Most stations, especially the high volume ones have a couple of guys running around handling customers. In fact, the Wawa brand stations encourage you to go in the store while the attendant is filling your car. When you get back, (if you used a credit/debit card) your receipt is hanging off your door handle. A pleasure. And Wawa hires middle aged to older men (and I've seen women too) as their pumpers. They're guys who really need a job or retired guys supplementing their incomes. They're nice and happy to help you. Originally self service wasn't allowed due to the hazards of people working the pumps. I still see idiots pumping gas and smoking a cigarette at the same time. And people use cell phones, which aren't intrinsically safe, which means they can spark an explosion. And there's enough cause for it to be banned on health and environmental concerns alone. It's funny that there are OSHA laws on proper training and handling of chemicals less hazardous than gasoline. With the current state of the economy, as big oil continues to report record profits, forget state laws (another peeve of mine!) if you want to put people to work enact a federal law prohibiting self service. Immediately thousands to maybe millions of jobs would be created.

Hoping your son saved your personal bar stool and saved it for ya. That's as good as owning one of those old stadium seats!

And for every girl you think is drop dead perfect, there's a guy who has just about had enough of her stuff! Engine / transmission choices in kits do drive me nuts. As others have said I'm more a six cylinder, or small block kinda guy. When I go to replicate, say my own old 1:1 1973 Barracuda, my car had a 318/auto not the biggest baddest engine with a 4 speed. I recently have been looking at building / restoring my series of full size Chevys... most of those in real life came with 6s, 283s and maybe 350s, mostly automatics! What's in the kits... all of them? Big block with a 4 speed... and an automatic interior!

Looks good Rich! I was just thinking I hadn't seen any posts about this project lately! Must be fun to see your old car slowly emerge from your bench!

I've never seen that before but I wouldn't know how self service works with cash since I always use a credit / debit card at the pump. Now the one that really ticks me off are the stations that charge 10 cents more a gallon if you use a credit card. I avoid those.

With all the armchair quarterbacking in this thread about what Revell 'coulda done, shoulda done' the one thing that hasn't been mentioned is the B word... BUDGET. It's easy to post pie in the sky here, but it all comes down to what is feasible with resources and funds at any given time. Past attempts at selling to kids may have been poor, but all that could be accomplished at the time. I remember the Revell snap series that included the Ramblur, were reissued with cartoon characters such as Charlie Brown on the prefinished bodies. I don't believe it worked because the vehicle subjects just didn't appeal to kids. Prior to the purchase of Revell by Hobbico, they didn't have any product development funds to do things they may have wanted to do. Hobbico understands the market and has funded a lot of kits that we all enjoy. Now the parent company is funding an attempt at an easy kit series, with the contempory subject matter that kids would be attracted to. Let's see how they do!

Its so deep here in PA that the deer are walking down the sidewalk! You can see this guy is up to his body in the snow in my backyard.

I have a resin body for a '72 Chevy Impala. It's got a chunk out of the back end, end cap to part of the trunk lid, and no, I don't have it. I'll be piecing in a section from a donor 73 Chevy body. So I'll be working with different medium on my repair and I don't anticipate any real issues.

My front walk... see ya in the spring! We go in the side and back door.